Former chief executive of Indonesia's energy firm Pertamina Karen Agustiawan (right) along with her lawyer Luhut Pangaribuan at the Central Jakarta Corruption Court June 24, 2024.

JAKARTA (June 25): A former chief executive of Indonesia's state energy firm Pertamina has been sentenced to nine years in jail for graft in a case related to a long-term contract to procure liquefied natural gas from a unit of US company Cheniere Energy.

The Central Jakarta Corruption Court on Monday found Karen Agustiawan guilty of improper procurement from the unit Corpus Christi Liquefaction, a video of the hearing showed. The court also fined her 500 million rupiah (RM143,778).

Her lawyer, Luhut Pangaribuan, told Reuters on Tuesday that she would appeal the verdict.

Cheniere did not immediately respond to a request for comment and Corpus Christi could not immediately be reached for comment. Pertamina said it respected the legal process.

Pertamina's first female CEO, who led the company between 2009 to 2014, Agustiawan was found guilty of improperly signing a long-term sales and purchase contract with Corpus Christi, a deal that caused state losses of US$113.84 million between 2011 and 2014, according to state news agency Antara.

Pertamina had resold LNG cargoes from Corpus Christi to the international market at a loss because the market in Indonesia could not absorb them, local media reports said.

Agustiawan had denied any wrong doing and said she was following government orders.

Corpus Christi was not a defendant in the case, but the panel of judges at the court said it had the "responsibility" to repay the country for the losses, media reported.

In a separate case in 2020, Agustiawan was acquitted by the Supreme Court when it overturned an eight-year prison sentence handed by a lower court over her decision for Pertamina to invest in the Basker Manta Gummy Block in Australia in 2009. The court had ruled at the time that her business judgment was not a crime.

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